


The Replacement Segment

by Marie_L



Category: Imperial Radch Series - Ann Leckie
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-09
Updated: 2019-06-09
Packaged: 2020-04-23 13:40:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,245
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19152169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Marie_L/pseuds/Marie_L
Summary: When Breq's old body is damaged beyond repair, one of the Anaanders orders a new ancillary segment defrosted as a replacement. Needless to say, the Fleet Captain does not approve.





	The Replacement Segment

**Author's Note:**

  * For [gostaks](https://archiveofourown.org/users/gostaks/gifts).



The process of transferring to a new ancillary isn't painful, but it is unpleasant to the Ship. Anaander Mianaai knows this of course, although she herself – in all her long millennia of existence, so far as Breq knows – has preferred to transfer to clones of her original body. The one exception, when one segment of Anaander commandeered Lieutenant Tisarwat's body, did not go well, for either one of them. Still, Breq can't help but suspect its the Widely recognized unpleasantness that Anaander is going for when she orders Breq resurrected into a new body.

The injustice of it, the fact that the tiny remaining bit of _Justice of Toren_ will be outraged that yet another human has died specifically so she can live, that's merely a bonus.

As soon a Breq opens her eyes, she knows what's been done, even before _Mercy of Kalr_ feeds her the data. The world is brighter, colder, noisy, _wrong._ It's right for this brain, but not for the new mind imposed upon it, whom had gotten quite used to the old brain's sensory systems and methods of processing. Back when she had been the full _Justice of Toren_ , replacing an ancillary had been minor inconvenience, for it would be one uncomfortable body among hundreds, plus the ship itself had its own sensory systems aside from the army of ancillaries. Replacing a single segment was like shaving down a metal screw to fill a non-standard sized hole, smoothing down the rough contours to make it fit into a seamless whole. If a particular screw couldn't handle the stress, if it broke in the process, it was simple enough to replace it.

Breq remembers all these things dispassionately. It doesn't change her fury at killing someone for the process now. At killing someone for her.

“What did you do,” she croaks at Medic, the second she is able to. It's not a question, and not her Medic, she manages to note. She's on Athoek Station, and the recognition of that fact gets a ping of approval and acknowledgment from Station. The ping isn't the same, different implants, _upgraded_ implants, many of same sorts she'd had deactivated and hidden as much as possible on the old body. She closed her eyes for a full five seconds, then opened them, to try again.

“Who ordered this?” she demands, although she knows the answer in her bones. None of her people would have done it, no matter their grief at losing their captain. Seivarden wouldn't allow it. And _Mercy of Kalr_ doesn't have ancillaries in its hold any more, so it can't have taken action itself. _Sphene_ is a possible source of the bodies, but no one would listen to _Sphene_.

And of course the voice is terrible. Anaander likely deliberately picked this body for that very reason, solely to irritate her.

“The Lord of the Radch,” says Medic, “insisted that _Justice of Toren_ be saved. Something about the Presger, and Significant Beings?” Calmly, blandly even. Likely forewarned on the irascibility of the Fleet Captain, no matter what body she occupies, and her explosive anger at the situation.

“Where is she?” Breq says, pushing herself up the exam table. Silently she queries Station: _And where's my crew? Seivarden? Tisarwat? Five, even? Certainly they haven't been scared off by this iteration of Anaander._

In reply, Station dumps a mountain of recent data into Breq's newly enhanced brain. It's disorienting, because this brain isn't used to processing a dozen data streams at once, but also comforting, to know anything at her tip of her mind's touch. And she remembers. The very young Lord of the Radch, as Anaander is apparently running low on clones, of the opposing faction – not that the allied faction of Anaander likes her any more than the opposing one. _Sword of Gurat_. Tisarwat's mission. Her lost leg.

Her lost body. She'll never forgive Anaander Mianaai for this. Add it to the list.

“Lieutenant Seivarden,” Station informs her in her ear, “has been banging down the door since she was informed of the procedure. Shall I let her in?”

“In a moment.” Breq pauses, as she thinks through the situation further. “Did you allow this, Station? Did you know what they were planning to do to me?” _To the person that could have been awakened, and has now died so I could take her place,_ Breq thinks, but does not send.

Station hesitates a solid three seconds before responding. “The ships all agreed. We need you, Fleet Captain. That the Lord of the Radch was willing to order the humans to have it done was a convenient coincidence.”

_Damn them all._ And damn her for giving them the power to choose in the first place. “ _Mercy of Kalr_ agreed too?”

“It was indecisive the longest, given your known preferences. But in the end _Mercy of Kalr_ wanted to keep you as Captain.”

Breq is mildly surprised by that. _Mercy of Kalr_ doesn't identify her in the category of human, just as Breq herself doesn't consider herself human, deep down. Captains, traditionally, must be human, the Radch's definition of human, pure of certain technological and genetic alterations. Yet they've both already accepted Breq as the exception to that definition. An AI as commander of another AI, not to mention AIs as commanders of themselves. Unheard of until now.

“Let Seivarden in,” she says, and Station complies.

Seivarden, it turns out, is accompanied by both Five and Eight. All of them start when they see her, in a different body. Even without Ship's data feed she can see their shock and hesitation.

For the first time Breq wonders what she looks like, and dredges up the relevant self-image from the segment's brain. She could do it in a more impersonal fashion, call up Station's images of the room or query the ship the body was stored on, but doesn't. Somehow inflicting the memories of the body on herself seems more appropriate. Although that person is dead, her memories live on in another. An irrelevant sentiment, perhaps,, but one that Breq forces herself to momentarily consider.

She looks Seivarden straight in the eye. “Who do I look like to you, Lieutenant?” she asks. One thing to be said for Seivarden, she won't hesitate to blurt out the truth.

“You look high-born, sir,” Seivarden says without a flinch. “Like a Mianaai.”

Indeed, in her brain's eye, she does. Dark skin, tall, heavy set, aristocratic nose and cheekbones. According to body's memories, the person didn't actually belong to any house, but instead was picked up all the way at the annexation of Inraal some nine hundred years prior. Breq idly wonders how many storage decks Anaander had to dig through to find someone who looked remotely _like a Mianaai._

Behind her, Five and Eight of Kalr are fussing over setting up a meal and tea service. How fast they adapt. Seivarden, too, looks nonplussed, after her initial shock.

“See, they'll get over it,” Station tells her, trying to be helpful. Breq wants to acknowledge that attempt, at kindness, a sign of favor, but isn't in the mood.

“But will I get over it, Station?” she growls. She tries to push herself off the bed, initially fails, and succeeds on the second try. She's wearing nothing but her implants, not even gloves.

“You've done it before,” Station says.

Breq sighs and puts on her pants. There's never anything to do but move forward, one unpleasant moment at a time.

  


  


  



End file.
